Strathclyde Professor of Strategic Management Dr Harry Sminia delivered an open seminar on September 30 at Strathclyde Business School's Dubai campus to students and graduates intrigued by the evening's theme question: 'Can a firm change the environment?'
Sharing case studies from his research, he demonstrated ways in which firms can and do – whether in isolation or cooperation – interact with and elicit changes from their environments.
Delving deep into examples from the US radio broadcasting industry, Dr Sminia highlighted ways in which the predominant business models and core activities changed repeatedly and drastically over a period of 45 years. The cases illustrated that activities, players and structures are all fluid and highly susceptible to the massive changes that can accompany a single firm's innovation, whether that be invention of new technologies, identification of new uses that make existing technologies more profitable, or something else that shakes up the entire environment.
According to Dr Sminia, "Being strategic means changing the social order that characterizes your environment to your own advantage."
Such efforts are not always successful, however, as he pointed out using the case of failed TV channel Dutch Sport7. The station's attempt to launch a 24-hour football network was thwarted as the surrounding players and markets were thoroughly unprepared for the structural and cultural changes the new offering required. The case served as a warning that deliberately adjusting your activities or offerings as an innovative firm is not enough. To be successful, a firm must also be able to assess and interfere with the interests, motivations, rules, and resources of its environment.
In doing so, Dr Sminia advises that innovators might look for new products or activities that will offer solutions to unresolved inconsistencies that already exist somewhere in the environment. He acknowledges, however, that there is no simple formula to being successful. "It is about understanding how the process proceeds," he says. "Changing the social order is a struggle to resolve contradictions involving many different interests."